I almost slammed into the back of Sutton when he came to an abrupt halt in front of the women and Sloane. My eyes found Ayda’s over Howard’s shoulder, and I saw the worried yet resigned look hidden in her unspoken words. The subtle shake of her head told me they’d not been successful in getting any more information out of Sloane—something that didn’t surprise me.

Howard inhaled sharply, taking a shaky step forward before he stopped himself and balled his fists down by his sides. The air was thick with a silence found in nightmares. It was strangling us all. Especially the chief and his daughter.

“Princess,” he whispered roughly.

Sloane’s eyes filled with even more tears. Her lip shook, and her chin trembled as she looked up at her father, knowing he knew what she’d wanted to hide from him. From all of us.

“Dad,” Sloane pushed out, her voice soft and her mouth dry, causing her to lick her lips furiously in a bid to gain some kind of movement.

I looked back at Ayda.

This whole fucking situation made my stomach feel like it had a thousand knots in it and someone was twisting them into a shape designed to make me want to bend over and vomit. I could take seeing a lot of nasty shit. Blood, dirt, bodies, bones, broken limbs, ripped off skin… I’d witnessed it all before. But the vulnerability shining from this teenage kid’s eyes was tearing me up in ways that reminded me of how I’d felt seeing Ayda in that warehouse.

Another woman we hadn’t protected.

Another dent in our armor.

“Sutton,” I whispered over his shoulder. “Breathe.”

His fists balled tighter, making his arms ramrod straight, his body trembling as he fought to stay in control.

I glanced at Autumn and saw her motherly sadness, too. It was all subtle glances, unspoken words, and a certain kind of grief that was letting everyone in the room know that one false move and the fragility of it all would come smashing down on the floor like a China plate.

Ayda stood from the bed, relinquishing her spot to Sutton who seemed to collapse there rather than sit. He and Sloane watched one another with cautious eyes only for another second before she threw herself into his arms with another sob of complete fragility. Ayda’s eyes met mine for only a second, the sadness easy to read.

Taking the offered hand, Ayda stepped closer and pressed herself against my chest, a small shaky breath falling from her lips as she nodded to the hall beyond the door. We left the others in the room, Sloane still in her father’s lap looking years younger than sixteen.

The moment we were alone, Ayda stepped back, her hands on my ribs as she caught my eyes. “Whoever did this, Drew, she’s protecting them.”

“I know.” I sighed heavily. “Have you spoken to Tate about any of this? Maybe he could give us some clues into who the assholes are at Babylon High.”

“He’s not home yet.” Ayda squeezed her eyes shut tight, swallowing the emotion that was still trying to escape in this mess. “He’s going to take this badly, too. I don’t understand how this could have happened in school, Drew. They’re supposed to be safe there.”

“High school wasn’t that long ago for you. Don’t pretend like it wasn’t the craziest fucking time of your life. No place scarier than those halls. No place. All those hormones. All those decisions to make. All those disasters waiting to happen…”

Dropping her hands, Ayda stepped back and pressed her back against the wall. Her fingers pushed through her blonde locks as she looked for some strength in the ceiling above her. “You’re right. It just never seems that bad when you’re living it. Then shit like this happens, and you start to wonder.” Tugging on her hair, she shook her head as though dismissing the thoughts, and dug into her pockets for her phone. “What do we do now?”

I scowled as she pulled out her phone. “We wait.” I took a step closer toward her, reaching out to place my hand on top of hers and her cell. “We make no plans. We let Sutton talk to his daughter, then we decide whether there’s a fucking scary ass tornado coming out of that door when he leaves, or one of those weird, slow-burning tsunamis. We bide our time. We deal with what’s put in front of us, Ayda.” My voice was a whisper. “Nothing more. Nothing less. Not yet.”

Nodding slowly in agreement, she stared down at our joined hands and built her resolve back up until her shoulders rolled and her chin stuck stubbornly forward. “You’re getting good at putting out fires, Mr. Tucker. Almost as good as you are at starting them.”

This time a small smile graced her lips, despite the situation.

“What about the twins?”

I reached up to push a stray hair behind her ear. “First of all, I never really start fires. They just seem to spread quicker when I’m around.” I smirked, locking eyes with her. “Second of all, I have too many reasons to react first and think later. My family isn’t simply built of men and muscle anymore. It’s got a bit more heart to it. A little bit of tenderness, too.” I winked. “And there are kids involved. As far as I know, the twins will be in daycare if Sutton was working when I called him. I can get one of the boys to bring them here if you think that’s best…”

“Maybe it’s just better to leave them for now. Stick to their routine. If Howard wants us to get them, I’ll go. Maybe for now it’s best that Sloane has his attention.” She shook her head again and smiled sadly up at me. “I’m just trying to think straight. I can’t even remember where I’m supposed to be right now. Deeks is with Kenny. Autumn and Sutton are with Sloane… Tate is… I should call Tate.”

“Take a minute,” I breathed down on her, stepping even closer, pressing my hand to her cheek. “Take a goddamn minute for yourself. Sloane is like a younger sister to you. It’s okay to feel like shit. We’ll deal with Tate when he gets back. Not before.”

“I’m good, just worried. You’re right about Tate. We can talk face to face when he gets back.” Glancing up at me, she placed her hand over my chest and raised her eyebrows. “You had a chance to talk to Slater?”

“No. I’ve let him brood for a while. He’s no doubt pacing somewhere with a bottle of whiskey in his hand, calling me every name he can create in that warped mind of his.” I dragged my free hand down my face, keeping my eyes closed as I spoke. “I need to talk to him, though. He’s right. I’d have reacted the same way he did if shit had been the other way around. I can’t keep pulling this crap and expecting everyone to just accept it.” I dropped my hand and opened my tired eyes. “I promised Pete I was gonna try to change. The doing is harder than the saying, apparently.”

“It was extenuating circumstances. I understand where he’s coming from here. I know they all worry with the current climate and uncertainty. We all worry. The timing was just unfortunate.” She fisted my shirt and released it with another sigh. “How about I make some food for everyone and hold things down here while you go and talk to Slate? He’ll only stew the longer you put it off. I’m pretty sure Sutton’s not going anywhere. Not for a while, at least.”

“Ayda, when will you listen to me for once? I said take a minute, not go and make a banquet for a hundred men. Go and do something for you. Take a shower. Go to the training room. Check out some gold. Drool over some of the cars we’ve brought in. I don’t give a shit, but I swear, if I see you making sandwiches and sweating it up in the kitchen, you’ll need to be worrying about what I do to you more than what I’m about to say to Slate.”

“The only thing I want to do is the same the rest of you want to do and are managing to resist. I’ll go and help Harry in the pawnshop, though. I like looking at some of the crap you get in there. I guess it will distract me.”

I stepped back, trying to look appalled. “Crap? We don’t take in crap!”

“Oh, baby.” She patted my chest with her palm and cracked a smile. “Some of it is absolute trash. I’m pretty sure one of your boys has a marshmallow heart and accepts crap to help the Babylonians.”

Holding both hands in the air, I stepped away from her completely. “Are you… are you even in the right place? Marshmallow hearts? In my Hut? In my club? We’re Hounds,” I assured her, trying not to crack a smile. “We foam at the mouth, howl at the moon, and rip people apart with our bare teeth. Be gone with your marshmallow heart talk, woman. Go on. Go. Get out of here.”

The look she gave me made her blue eyes flare to life, dimming some of the sadness and worry that had accumulated there. Rolling her eyes dramatically, she finally allowed her smile to break free as she pressed her lips against mine and started backing away toward the bar.

“You’re a bunch of heathens and I love you for it.” She smiled again, kissed her fingertips and blew it at me. “Call me if you need me. I love you.”

“And that kind of talk doesn’t fit around here either,” I called to her, mouthing a silent I love you, back at her before she disappeared out of sight… leaving me to go and deal with the other love of my life:

Goddamn Slater Portman.

I found him in the repo lot, sitting in the driver’s seat of a 1968 electric pink Ford Mustang we’d recently repossessed from one of the guys in the mayor’s office who’d gotten himself into way too much gambling debt. The white roof was up and Slater’s head had to be pressing against it. A vintage car it may have been, but it sure wasn’t made to hold a giant.

His arm rested on the open window ledge, a bottle of whiskey hanging from his limp fingertips as he stared forward, out through the chain links of the yard like a man possessed.

I didn’t make eye contact as I climbed into the passenger seat.

Despite the age of the car, it smelled new. Too new. Too polished. It made my throat clog with shit as I quietly pulled the door shut, slouched down in my seat and stared out through the front window.

The only sound that could be heard was the sloshing of the alcohol in the bottle as he lifted it to his lips, took a drink, then let it hang out of the open window again.

“Some days I feel like all I do is apologize,” I eventually said, breaking the silence.

He didn’t answer. Instead, he sniffed loudly, the same way I used to do when I was too fucking angry to verbalize what I was thinking.

“Sometimes I mean it. Other times I don’t,” I added quietly.

Slater sighed.

“I’m not going to apologize today, Slate. What I am going to do is tell you that I’m real fucking honored to have you in my life… and I’m real fucking honored that you care so much about me, you’re willing to become a moody fucker when I piss you off and give it to me straight.”

“Fuck you,” he hissed, low and not at all threatening.

“I love you, too, brother.”

“Don’t try this reverse psychology shit with me, Tucker.” He inhaled and exhaled even louder again. “Do you have any idea what it felt like to walk into that warehouse all those months ago, and see an enemy pointing a gun at your bust up head? Do you have any idea of the dread and the fear I felt seeing you staring down the barrel of a gun with a building full of dead Emps around you?”

“It wasn’t exactly Thanksgiving for me, Slate.”

His attention turned quickly, snapping in my direction as he burned holes in the side of my head. I stared straight ahead, though. I could allow him his time.

“You know how you loved Pete?” he asked roughly.

I nodded, swallowing quickly. “Yeah.”

“Well, that’s how I love you. And I know I haven’t always been on a pedestal the way he was up there with you staring up at him. I know you’ve always seen me as some best friend equal. Maybe even someone beneath you—”

“Never.” I turned to face him quickly, my eyes narrowed and my jaw tense. “Never beneath me.”

“But never above you either.” He paused, grinding his teeth together before he raised the bottle of whiskey to his lips again, took another drink and dropped it in between his legs. “And that’s okay. I never wanted to be. I respected your relationship with our brother. I loved Pete, too. What I’m asking you to understand is that I see you the same way you saw him.” Slater lifted his free hand above his head, never taking his eyes from me. “Way up here. And so long as there is breath in my big-ass lungs, Tucker, I’m going to be your sergeant at arms. I’m going to be your tactician. I’m going to be the man at the front, willing to take a bullet to save your skinny fucking chest. I’m going to be the man wishing it was me taking the hits so you don’t have to.”

My face softened, the reality of what I’d already known sinking in, penetrating my already full heart.

And it was when I was looking at him—Slater, a man breaking himself apart in front of me so I could fix myself up with his pieces—that I began to realize there were so many different kinds of love. The stuff I had for Ayda was intoxicating and powerful. It clouded my mind and gave me purpose. The love I had for my brothers, for Slater, was deep. It was embedded in my soul. It gave me clarity. It gave me focus.

“I wouldn’t want anyone else by my side,” I told him.

“Then fucking respect me once in awhile.”

I nodded. “I’m not just your president. I’m your friend. Your best friend. I don’t want to make excuses, but I lose my way sometimes, and I’m only just learning to admit that. But don’t you ever take my loyalty and brotherhood for you as anything less than what it is. If I ain’t respecting you, you let me know the first second I disrespect you. You understand me?”

Slater’s jaw was tense as he looked at me. “Yeah, I understand.”

“I’m sorry I let you down, brother.”

“You didn’t.” He sighed, turning his attention back to the view through the chain links.

I followed him, looking out through the front of the car window, too. “You pout worse than Ayda.” I smirked.

“Yeah, well, you can fuck the mood out of her. I ain’t ever letting you near my ass, Tucker, so sometimes you just have to put the fucking work in.”

“Always willing.”

“Noted.”

“You know what?”

“What?” he said through a sigh, bringing the bottle back to his lips.

I felt my smile grow as my eyes found a crow, and I watched it flying through the sky without a care in the world.

“I fucking love you, Slater Portman.”

“Kiss my ass, Drew Tucker.”

The moment I heard his barely-there huff of laughter, I knew he’d thawed.

I was grateful, too. I was nothing without my fellow Hounds.